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Attachment Parenting
lpstl
member
Never using bottles?
lpstl
member
I follow this awesome blog over on simplemom.net, I really love most posts but the girl who runs it is on maternity leave, so she has some guest posters filling in for her.
Today there was a post called "Simplifying Babyhood: Top Items for Baby?s First Year and Beyond".
I was actually going to post to it on my blog, but then realized she forgot some pretty critical items (like clothes, a carseat, and bottles). I asked about it, and she said she figured a carseat and clothes were a given (well, the it's not a complete list, but whatever). Her answer about the bottles threw me though.
She said: "I am a breastfeeding mom who advocates complete, extended breastfeeding to moms who are able, with a transition straight over to a cup or sippy when baby is ready.For those who are unable to breastfeed for any reason, of course bottles would be an essential!"
Do people really do this? What happens if you get stuck in a traffic jam on the way home to your baby, and he's starving? What if, god forbid, something happened to you. Wouldn't you want a freezer stash and some bottles "just incase"? And really, the only people who need bottles are those who couldn't BF? Right.
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Never using bottles?
Breastfeeding Counselor with Breastfeeding USA
Babywearing Guide ** Newborn Carriers
Cloth Diaper Guide
Safe Bed Sharing Info
we have one bottle. corbin has drank out of it like three times to get him used to eating out of a bottle when we had a full day of a baby shower a wedding and an engagement dinner. once the day came he wouldnt drink out of it and i ended up just nursing him in the car [lifting my dress up over my head! haha] since then he has never even used a bottle. its so much easier to just nurse him wherever i am. i've hardly ever left him, but if i do i just make sure im home before its time to eat.
My LO hasn't taken many bottles lately...maybe one a week or less. But he did at first when we were supplementing. I don't have a freezer stash right now because 1. I don't need it yet and 2. my supply hasn't levelled off yet and pumping has been throwing it out of whack. That said, I have plenty of bottles and I have left over formula from the supplementing stage if we ever needed it. I also plan to build a stash for when I go back to school part time in the fall.
I guess you could always run out and buy bottles/formula in an emergency, but you would likely be dealing with a very unhappy baby who is really hungry and then possibly struggling with the unfamiliar nipple.
Maybe I'm just paranoid then, I'd want to have something on hand as a Plan B, just incase.
Ok, and I'll be honest, I like my girls night out with a nice bottle of wine too
.
I'm a SAHM and I plan to nurse and skip bottles for a sippy later, but I do have a medela swing and some bottles just in case I ever need to be away from her.
See I EBF and SAH so I thought oh no need to pump really or mess with bottles. Uh yah that was until I had to go to the ER and be away from him for 8 hours then a few days later have surgery!! To the women that say " I will just take LO wherever I go" please think twice because if he had refused the bottle I don't know what I would have done!!!!
Oh I still don't give a bottle tons but enough to where if he would to need to take it he will.
This was us. I hate pumping and the way it messed with my supply and if I was gone long enough, I'd have to step out and pump anyway (I was a chronic leaker for almost 10 months) which was its own hassle.
There are very few emergencies where you wouldn't either be able to take your baby (family funerals, natural disasters etc.) or where you wouldn't be at a hospital with access to pumps, bottles etc. The number of emergencies where you truly wouldn't be able to BF without time for planning are so rare and tragic it's not worth planning for them, getting your LO to take formula and a bottle will likely be the least of your family's problems.
M never took to a bottle well, but took to a sippy and regular cup (held by us) at about 5 months. That's worked just fine for others to give him milk. I have about 8 bottles we purchased and were given and the only one I've ever used was the one that attaches to the pump. The rest were a waste for us.
It's definitely not the right choice for everyone and their lives, but I don't think it's that crazy.
This exactly! I was fully planning on pumping and bottle feeding PT, but once I had DS I figured why add all the extra work of pumping, preparing bottles, cleaning bottles etc, when I really didn't need to. Also, I had major oversupply and OAL issues that I was able to fix them by adjusting how I BF DS. I didn't want to pump and then mess all that up again. It was a lot cheaper for us too!
This + the fact that DS barely tolerated the bottles for 8 months of daycare. We could have definitely done without them!
This! If we could have avoided bottles, we totally would have. DD would have been thrilled to skip them.
ditto soon2be and aglenn. i work FT, so bottles were a must for us, but we'd gladly have done without them!
a friend who SAH kept a hand pump and a very small freezer stash. i think their plan was that her SO would attempt to cup feed in a real emergency. beyond that, it was nursing.
The only time we used bottles was when Neriah was three weeks old before we finally got her on the breast (we finger fed for the first three weeks). As soon as we got her nursing, we cut out bottles, so no, we don't have a 'stash' and Neriah doesn't know how to take a bottle.
She is awesome with sippys now though!
S would never take a bottle so we gave them all away before she was 3 months old. I once had to be away from her for 12 hours and she literally would not eat at all. Now when we are away from each other she will drink out of a sippy cup.
Honestly, it was SO hard those first few months because I could not be away from the baby for more than two hours. Until she was 6 months old I had to schedule everything around feedings.
Now I can see not having bottles around the house at all. I have issues with my expressed BM so I can not pump- if my LO needs to eat and I am not available it needs to be formula. I dont know what we will do with baby #2 but after surviving we may not introduce a bottle.
We've never used bottles with DD. She wouldn't nurse off of my left side for the first three weeks, so I pumped like a madwoman and had a killer freezer stash by the time she was a month old. Yeah. Never used a single ounce of it. (And since donating breast milk is illegal here, I had to throw the whole stash in the bin, but that's another angry rant.) We tried a few times, but she didn't like the bottle and it was so much easier to nurse her. Plus pumping sucks ass.
I admit, there are times in the beginning when I wished I could leave her for longer periods of time, but usually I don't need to go anywhere for THAT long. And now that she's older, I CAN leave for a bit longer. The other day I was doing a photo shoot for five hours and she was totally fine. So I don't consider myself 'chained to her'. And for the poster who said she likes her wine, I still drink it! I just don't get plowed
Same here! And a date with my husband. And to just be kid free for a few hours without worrying about him starving.
If I didn't work, we probably could have survived without bottles, but I really liked leaving the house when I needed to without worrying about if he was hungry or not.
Wow, so it seems like this is more common than I thought. I guess I'm surprised that it works for so many people, because it seems like you really couldn't be away from LO for more than maybe an hour. I guess if you choose not to use bottles ever, you really choose never to be apart from LO, right?
ETA: I definitely admire it, but I'm too much of a worrier, the first time I hit a traffic jam I'd probably hyperventilate
.
But that would only be true for the first few months. As they get older they don't need to eat as often. Many babies will refuse a bottle or not take much from a bottle and will instead nurse extra to make up for it later.
When kiddo was 7 or 8 months, he stopped taking bottles when I was away at class - he'd just nurse to make up for it when I got home. Honestly, when he was really little, I didn't want to be away for that long.
Pumping and bottles are a great tool to have if you need/want them but one can survive without ;-)
Breastfeeding Counselor with Breastfeeding USA
Babywearing Guide ** Newborn Carriers
Cloth Diaper Guide
Safe Bed Sharing Info
For us it was like that for about 6 months. About then many will start to stretch out feedings and once they are eating table food and closer to a year it gets MUCH better.
I also like a good girls night out so I drink but dont get plastered. When I get home I drink a ton of water and since S only gets up once to eat around 4am I dont worry about it.
No I don't really think it's that common... remember this is the AP board so it's going to be more exclusively nursing Mamas (IMO anyway
)
I, like you would worry.... I have heard too many stories of friends supplys tanking unexpectedly.... Then they are sick with worry and can't get the baby to take a bottle... or formula...I just couldn't do it. I thought it was absolutely so important that my LO learn to suck from a bottle and take bottles of pumped milk. Not only to have a couple hours away (weddings, girls nights, hell anything social!) but in the begininng when he took 45 min to nurse and nursed all.the.damn.time... it was soooo good for my sanity to be able to give a bottle and give myself a little break (I SAH btw)
But in general supplies don't tank if you breastfeed on demand (unless you have an illness or something extreme going on). Many supply tanks happen when mom returns to work (NOT knocking returning to work!) or when solids start (and nursing sessions are dropped too quickly or solids pushed too early), or when mom night weans, or if pumped milk is given frequently - those things disrupt the supply demand mechanism of nursing and supply issues can result.
So if you are a stay at home mama who nurses on demand (including at night) and takes it slow with solids, it's highly unlikely that you'll randomly have a supply issue.
Again - not knocking the choice to pump or work at all - just pointing out that if you don't do those things, it's highly unlikely that you'd ever need an emergency stash. Of course, there's nothing wrong with building one either nor is there anything wrong with giving a bottle or pumping ;-)
Breastfeeding Counselor with Breastfeeding USA
Babywearing Guide ** Newborn Carriers
Cloth Diaper Guide
Safe Bed Sharing Info
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I know people whose children have never had a bottle. I would have lost my mind. DS stopped taking a bottle a couple weeks ago and its driving me nuts.
I am a WAHM so I'm never far from m... he used a bottle during his first week at night and since then won't take one at all... we never had a freezer stash (at one point i think we had 6 oz in there) and the only time that i pumped was when he went on strike...
i have TONS of bottles that people gave us that we never used and apparently never will since he is on a sippy... I am not sure that i would tell people not to get them but the way that it worked out for us we haven't had to use them...
bf ds for 18 months he never had a bottle--- I'm a sahm and I don't pump
bfing dd now and she doesn't get a bottle
Same here, and I still don't. That's just my personality though. I'm not a super social person who needs to get out. I would much prefer to be at home.
Also, we just moved to the area when DD was a week old, and we have no family close by, so we never had the option of a babysitter anyway. There's still no one we're close enough to that I (or DD) would feel comfortable enough with to have them babysit. For us, it was never an issue that she wouldn't take a bottle.
No bottles here. We took bottles for the first couple of weeks, but since then it's been breast only, and now they wouldn't take a bottle if I tried, which is fine. We are starting to take water from a straw cup now, though : ) And yes, I do get away sometimes for a couple of hours- now that they have started solids, I don't worry about getting stuck in traffic on the way home, etc.- DH can always give them a little snack.
With twins, I think it's way easier not to have to deal with washing and preparing bottles x2.
With DS#2, I never used a bottle. Not because I didn't want to, but because he completely flat out refused and would scream bloody murder for anyone watching him until I came back and BF'ed him!
Grrr........ It was very frustrating not being able to leave him, or take care of the screaming baby in the car. I just waited too long to introduce the bottle.
Noel - August 2010
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Noel - August 2010
Crazy about Christmas? Check out our blog!
My good, old, rarely-updated toddler food blog
Coming out of lurking....
If I was a SAHM, I don't think we would use bottles. (FWIW, I will still be teaching a 2 hour class once a week once LO is about 1 month. So, yes, we will use bottles.) I can tell you that my family still doesn't let me live down the fact that I never took a bottle. Okay, I didn't take a bottle until I was 16 months. By that point of course, it was a moot point. My mom just kept trying bottles because she wanted to know if I'd ever get it.
Oh....and I didn't eat solid foods until I was 1 year and 10 days old. Yeah, I think my mom hopes my LO is just like me!
Going back to lurking...
I am not in this camp as I work FT (and worked really long shifts when DS was younger) so he took more bottles of BM than nursing many days and nights.
Although, if I was a SAHM, I can see that I wouldn't want to pump if not neccessary.I would have probably tried to give a bottle though, just because I did pump and give a bottle when DS was very tiny ( a week or two) and had absolutely no problem with doing so, or with nursing. babies at that age are actually pretty adaptable once nursing is well established.
Well, DD used one for daycare each day, but when I have another child I'll be staying home. I don't anticipate using any bottles with #2 when the time comes because I'll always be with the baby.
The only time I pumped at home was the first few nights after we brought DD home. It allowed me to get about a four hour stretch of sleep if DH fed her a bottle about 2 hrs. after BFing.
DS hasn't taken a bottle since he was about 3 weeks old. We had such a hard time breastfeeding in the beginning so we would mostly finger feed and give the occasional bottle when desperate. When we finally got the hang of breastfeeding I put away the pump and nursed constantly and haven't looked back. We don't live near family and don't have anyone we trust to leave DS with a sitter and I SAH so we are never apart.
Now that I have my sister's bachelorette party and wedding coming up, I am sort of wishing I had kept giving him the occasional bottle, because now he refuses one! Going to try to have DH give him one while I go out to see how he does, but I am definitely nervous.